CASE6

Case 6: Managing work safety and health

Workplace Safety and the Law

There are two sets of workplace safety laws: (1) workers’ compensation, an employer-funded insurance system that operates at the state level, and (2) the Occupational Safety and Health Act (OSHA), a federal law that mandates safety standards in the workplace.
Workers’ compensation—which consists of total disability, impairment, survivor, medical expense, and rehabilitation benefits—is intended to ensure prompt and reasonable medical care to employees injured on the job, as well as income for them and their dependents or survivors. It also encourages employers to invest in workplace safety by requiring higher insurance premiums from employers with numerous workplace accidents and injuries. 
OSHA compels employers to provide a safe and healthy work environment, to comply with specific occupational safety and health standards, and to keep records of occupational injuries and illnesses. Its safety standards are enforced through a system of inspections, citations, fines, and criminal penalties.

Managing Contemporary Safety, Health, and Behavioral Issues

The most significant safety, health, and behavioral issues for employers are AIDS, violence in the workplace, cumulative trauma disorders, fetal protection, hazardous chemicals, and genetic testing. In all of these areas, line managers must deal with a variety of practical, legal, and ethical questions that often demand a careful balancing of individual rights (especially privacy rights) with the needs of the organization.

Safety and Health Programs

Comprehensive safety programs are well-planned efforts in which management (1) involves employees and carefully considers their suggestions, (2) communicates safety rules to employ- ees and enforces them, (3) invests in training supervisors to demonstrate and communicate safety on the job, (4) uses incentives to encourage safe behaviors and discipline to penalize unsafe behaviors, and (5) engages in regular self-inspection and accident research to identify and cor- rect potentially dangerous situations.
Employee assistance programs (EAPs) are designed to help employees cope with physical, mental, or emotional problems (including stress) that are undermining their job performance.
Wellness programs are preventive efforts designed to help employees identify potential health risks and deal with them before they become problems. 

Wellbeings at work: Physical, psychological and social wellbeings 

Case 6A: Exhausted' Merrill Lynch intern died from epileptic fit in shower after he 'pulled three all-nighters at bank where employees compete to work the longest hours

• Moritz had medical conditions the company didn't know about
• Long working hours caused fatigue
• The bank does not monitor employees' working hours
• Lack of wellness programs for interns

Case 6B: Do Corporate Wellness Programs Really Work?

• Too many wellness programs are only focused on physical wellbeing
• Focus on wellbeing beyond the physical—it can lead to happier, healthier employees
• Wellness programs are more effective when considering long-term ROI

Sources: Case A CASE B Gomez-Mejia, L.R., Balkin, D.B. and Cardy, R.L. 2016. Managing Human Resources. Global Edition 8/E. Pearson. London. ISBN-10: 1292097248

CASE5

Case 5: The puzzle of motivation

Key points and challenges

• There is a mismatch between what science knows and what business does. Businesses are not doing things according to science.
• Nowadays how we motivate people in HRM is built entirely around extrinsic motivators.
• Too many organizations are making their decisions, their policies about talent and people, based on assumptions that are outdated, unexamined, and rooted more in folklore than in science.
• Challenges in pay-for-performance plans

Good points taken

• Rewards work really well for those sorts of tasks, where there is a simple set of rules and a clear destination to go to.
• Rewards narrow our focus by nature, and concentrate our mind.
• Left-brained, routine kind of work can easily be outsourced, what really matters are the right-brained, creative, conceptual kind of abilities.
• In 21st century we need a new approach, the reward-and-punishment is simply outdated.

Problems in pay-for-performance plan

• The "do only what you get paid for" syndrome
• Incentives might induce employees to engage in undesirable behaviours
• Individual merit system assume that the employee is in control of the major factors affecting his or her work output
• Individual performance is difficult to measure, and tying pay to inaccurate performance measure is likely to create problems.
• The credibility gap
• Merit pay can place employees under a great deal of stress and lead to job dissatisfaction
• Decrease employees' intrinsic motivation (block talents and creativity)

Solution

• Promote the belief that performance makes a difference
• Build employee trust
• Use motivation and nonfinancial incentives
• Use multiple layers of rewards
• Increase employee involvement

Sources: Gomez-Mejia, L.R., Balkin, D.B. and Cardy, R.L. 2016. Managing Human Resources. Global Edition 8/E. Pearson. London. ISBN-10: 1292097248

TED talk the puzzle of motivation

CASE 4

Case: Super-sized gamification for training- McDonald's is loving it

Key points and challenges:

• The case is mainly about McDonald's new training method